A view of the Island
, 1975
42.5 x 32.5 cm (h x w)
Lithograph
Shakespeare’s play is set on an uninhabited island, a pre-Robinson-Crusoe-type island. Chagall’s half-page header to Act 1, scene 1, has little to do with the scene of the shipwreck that follows. Rather than depicting here the storm, Chagall draws a view of the island, with an outline of far-off houses on a hill. The houses are hardly commensurate with the idea of the island being uninhabited.